A Very Bookish Murder

Title: A Very Bookish Murder
Author: Dee MacDonald
Published: September 19, 2025 by Bookouture
Format: Paperback, 240 pages
Genre: Amateur Sleuth
Series: Ally McKinley Mystery #3

Blurb: When Ally McKinley hears that well-known novelist Jodi Jones is going to host a writers’ retreat at the hotel just down the road, she’s delighted to offer rooms at her little guesthouse for some of the attendees. Ally is thrilled to join the group for one of their first sessions – but the retreat has barely begun before she finds the famous writer strangled in the ladies' bathroom!

The cake tin and teapot come out at the little guesthouse in the Highlands as Ally begins to question her bookish guests. Accusations of plagiarism and infidelity start flying and it’s clear that more than one of the retreat attendees had a grudge against Jodi. But could any of them have resorted to murder?

When Ally discovers a diary in Jodi’s bedroom at the guesthouse with several pages ripped out of it, she thinks she’s close to cracking the case. But the plot thickens when another of the aspiring writers is found dead, only hours after she said she knew the identity of Jodi’s killer.

Not only is the murderer still in Locharran, they’re desperate to stop Ally getting to the truth. With her faithful puppy Flora by her side, can Ally unravel the clues and solve the mystery before she’s written out of the story for good?

My Opinion: This novel felt like a slog from the start. The writer’s retreat introduces so many women so quickly that they blend into one vague crowd, and by the time the murders happened, I struggled to care who died or who was being questioned.

The Scottish touches should have added charm, but the regional vocabulary often felt forced, almost like someone trying too hard to sound local. A few odd shifts where Ally suddenly refers to herself in third person didn’t help the flow either.

The familiar Locharran cast returns, and the new detective, DI Amir Kandahar, could bring some spark to future books. But here, the retreat storyline dominates. Accusations of plagiarism spiral into tales of affairs and grudges, and the repetition makes the plot feel stuck.

There’s also a lot of filler with clothing descriptions, redundant conversations, and long passages that don’t deepen the mystery. With such a large cast and so much unnecessary detail, staying engaged became a challenge.

Will I keep going with the series? Maybe, but I’m not rushing. It’s still surprising how much I loved the Kate Palmer books, because this series feels like it’s written by someone entirely different.

Sunsets, Sabbatical & Scandal

Title: Sunsets, Sabbatical & Scandal
Author: Tonya Kappes
Published: March 17, 2020, by Tonya Kappes
Format: Paperback, 204 Pages
Genre: Amateur Sleuth
Series: Camper & Criminals (#10)

Blurb: A beloved resident of Normal, Kentucky is found dead on the floor of the Normal Diner, leaving the entire town on high alert. Faster than the short order cook can say order up... the laundry ladies are in the scene.

News spreads fast about the murder and Detective Hank Sharp is hungry for answers.

Mae West along with the Laundry Club ladies come up with a list of suspects and the evidence is piling up faster than a juicy double cheeseburger.

Who murdered the beloved citizen?

Was it a hit to score some extra lunch money?

My Opinion: I’ll admit it. When I opened the book and saw hints of a wedding plot, I sighed. I thought we were headed straight into another overused storyline. Thankfully, that thread turned out to be a tiny blip in the larger picture.

What really caught my attention was learning the term “juice jacking.” I’d heard the warnings about public charging stations, but I had no idea there was an actual name for it. Leave it to Tonya Kappas to slip in something unexpectedly educational.

This installment takes a more serious turn than the usual breezy visit to Normal, Kentucky. Mae returns to her hometown and is hit with devastating news about her parents’ deaths. She’s carried guilt for years, believing she played a part in what happened. Now she’s forced to confront the possibility that she was wrong, and the emotional fallout is heavy. But she isn’t facing it alone. That’s the beauty of this series. The found family around Mae gives the story its warmth even when the subject matter darkens.

Of course, there’s still a murder to solve. Mae stays one step ahead of her detective boyfriend, and the laundry ladies continue to show up before anyone even has time to dial for help. It’s familiar, a little chaotic, and exactly the kind of comfort I reach for when I want a quiet afternoon with a book.

The ending genuinely surprised me. I usually spot the culprit early, but this time I didn’t see it coming. Maybe the clues were there and I missed them, or maybe Kappas simply outmaneuvered me.

Call it repetitive if you want, but I enjoy this series. Each mystery stands alone, so readers can jump in anywhere, yet the charm of Normal and its residents keeps me coming back. There’s just something about this community, and Mae’s journey through it, that makes the return trip worthwhile every time.

Sugar and Spite

Title: Sugar and Spite
Author: M.C. Beaton, R.W. Green
Published: October 14, 2025 by Minotaur Books
Format: Kindle, 256 Pages
Genre: Amateur Sleuth
Source: My thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book.
Series: Agatha Raisin #36

Blurb: When a series of deaths within the small Cotswolds birdwatching community begins to unravel her village, Agatha and her team at Raisin Investigators are certain there has been foul play involved. Now, they must dig up decades' worth of tempestuous relationships and simmering secrets among the birdwatching enthusiasts of the village in order to prevent any further deaths.

But with Agatha's own relationship with John Glass on the rocks after he is called away on his job as a cruise ship dance instructor, and Sir Charles Fraith now attempting to step into John’s shoes as her lover, Agatha has her work cut out for her.

Agatha will have to break out her binoculars and embrace her bitter side to solve the murders and wrangle the sickly-sweet temptations in her own life. Will she be able to gather all the breadcrumbs and put together the clues before she becomes a sitting duck herself?

My Opinion: I wasn’t prepared for the way this ending landed. It snuck up on me and delivered every emotional beat I didn’t realize I’d been waiting for. Up until then, the book had been a bit uneven—twisty in places, sluggish in others—but that final stretch lifted it from an okay installment into something more satisfying.

I’ve been openly skeptical about R.W. Green continuing the series after M.C. Beaton’s passing. For a long time, it felt like he couldn’t quite capture the sharp, distinctly female perspective that makes Agatha Raisin who she is. But this book surprised me. For the first time, I felt that spark again, the one that makes Agatha both maddening and irresistible.

All the familiar faces are here, and their interactions feel comfortably in step with the long-running series. The new characters tied to the murder, though, were harder to keep straight. I’m not sure if it was the way they were introduced or simply that they blurred together, but I found myself pausing more than once to remember who was who.

As for Agatha’s future, I genuinely don’t know where she goes from here. Maybe we’re seeing the beginnings of a refreshed version of her. Then again, part of her charm is that she never really changes. She’s still the woman who barrels into trouble, emerges from mud puddles with perfect lipstick, and spots a liar from a mile away. That’s why readers keep coming back. No matter how twisty the mystery gets, Agatha remains Agatha, and that’s the real draw.

The Old Fire

Title: The Old Fire
Author: Elisa Shua Dusapin
Translator: Aneesa Abbas Higgins
Published: January 13, 2026, by S&S/Summit Books
Format: Kindle, 192 Pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Source: My thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book.

Blurb: Agathe leaves New York and returns to her home in the French countryside, after fifteen years away.

She and her sister Véra have not seen each other in all those years, and they carry the weight of their own complicated lives. But now their father has died, and they must confront their childhood home on the outskirts of a country estate ravaged by a nearby fire before it is knocked down. They have nine days to empty it. As the pair clean and sift through a lifetime’s worth of belongings, old memories, and resentments surface.

Tender and tense, haunting and evocative, The Old Fire is Elisa Shua Dusapin’s most personal and moving novel yet. An exploration of time and memory, of family and belonging, it is also a graceful and profound look at the unsaid and the unanswered, the secrets that remain, and whether you can ever really go home again.

My Opinion: Every so often, a book sneaks up on me, and this novel did exactly that. At under 200 pages, it shouldn’t have hit as hard as it did, yet here I am full of feelings, full of questions, and already imagining the kind of conversations it would spark in a book club.

The novel follows two sisters, Agatha and Véra, who reunite after their father’s death to sort through the remnants of their childhood home. Agatha bolted the moment she was old enough, while Véra stayed behind to shoulder the responsibility she left her with. Their week together is a slow excavation of memory with humor tucked beside resentment, tenderness brushing up against old wounds, and a kind of honesty that only siblings can manage. Even so, plenty remains unspoken.

Dusapin threads in the girls’ earlier years with a light but deliberate hand with Véra’s sudden muteness, Agatha’s fierce instinct to protect her, and the mother who walked away without much care for what she left behind. These pieces don’t form a tidy puzzle, but they deepen the emotional terrain the sisters must navigate.

By the end, Dusapin resists the urge to explain everything. Instead, she leaves space for the reader to sit with the unknowns and stitch together meaning on their own. It’s unsettling in the best way. Not everyone will call this a perfect book, but it blindsided me, and now I’m left turning it over in my mind, accepting that some stories aren’t meant to be tied up neatly.